This paper attempts to interpret the meaning of Mies van der Rohe's famous aphorism that “less is more” in terms of space. From his assertion that the art of building is the spatial execution of spiritual decisions, one can presume that his art of building was revealed through his spatial execution consciously guided by creative principles. One of his spatial principles was less is more a representative motto for the creation of sparsely furnished space with few objects and little perceptible architecture. After his awareness of an open plan, Mies intended to create less architecture by designing a minimal form of structural frames and maximum openness of open plans and glazed walls. This study posits that Mies created more potential space, for which he intended his open plans and neutral frames to be viewed as less. His building was designed to serve as the background of works of art and the changing nature outside so restrained its own existential voice in favor of the achievement of total harmony.

This study based on the hypothesis which the spatial qualities in the Mies's early works are not extinct but potentially immanent in his latter works. In Mies's early works, destruction of outline, centrifugal extension of fluid space, and asymmetry are distinctly showed. These qualities probably revert to the indefiniteness of space. In Mies's latter works, however, these dynamic qualities are disappeared. Geometrically precise outline and exact grid structure represent universal space derived from zero-degree pure box. These qualities probably revert to tile definiteness of space, characterized by the unmovable emptiness. Although Mies works vary in external form, his expression technique of space reveals continually both the qualify of definitive and indefinitive space. For example, in the Museum for a Small City(1942) unbuilt project. elements defined by the perspective are fixed and static, but elements defined by the collages are floated and dynamic. The former reigns over the realized buildings of Mies, while the latter seems to be latent in terms of Schein which transcends reality. If we can penetrate this point, it's possible to read the other side of Mies' architectural works, distinct from both the canonized interpretation and the excessive criticism. Point is that later works of Mies must be understood as interplay of universal space appeared as phenomenon and flowing elements latent in. Architectural space of Mies keeps a distance with actual space through latent manner of being while preserves the empirical actuality It provides us with an occasion which appears only in an instant, in which even the ordinary things reveal its poetics.